Desktop Environments News: KDE, GNOME, XFCE...
- Dr. Roy Schestowitz
- 2014-03-11 14:02:51 UTC
- Modified: 2014-03-11 14:02:51 UTC
K Desktop Environment/KDE SC/Qt
The primary goal of the conference was to encourage people to get involved with open source and to understand its power and its reach. We also wanted to help them get started by teaching them the basics and by getting them to know more about KDE. When the conference was over, it didn't matter how many lines of code anyone could understand or even actually write. If some people were convinced of the magic of open source and of KDE, and are now willing to be contributors to this noble cause even if only slightly, then the event accomplished its aim. Events, speakers and mentors like these add fuel to the fire inside. Students were inspired to reach out and experience the power of free and open source technology.
-
As my readers probably know there won’t be a combined release as the software compilation used to be. There are independent ongoing projects around the libraries (frameworks or KF5) the workspaces (Plasma Next) and the applications. These projects have independent release cycles and are not one product. I know, I know, many people will disagree and say that it’s still one. But if we go for this strong simplification both “will support Wayland” and “will not support Wayland” are true.
-
Today I ported the ~7.5 year-old "services" KRunner plugin to Sprinter and added support for some of the new Sprinter features in the process, which I show in the video below. It felt like something of a milestone to have the first plugin I wrote for KRunner now running on libsprinter. :)
-
"Community" why is that more important than "Design"? Because it is design. It is the basis of Open Source Design. One of my favorite distros and desktops (aside from Plasma Desktop) is Crunchbang. It's one of my first pure Linux Loves and will always have a certain place in my heart.Crunchbang got one huge chunk of design right: communication. Design is communication - it is not just "make pretty", its the ability to communicate goals, ideals and ideas to a group. In Open Source the benefit we have is that everyone can be a part - we use it in almost every aspect, from the Kernel up to Widget programming. But we tend to forget Design because design have a myth about it of the "Lone Genius" and that "Design by committee" it's supposed counterpart is somehow "bad for design".
-
It’s Christmas time for KDE Software users, the team has just announced the first beta of the 4.13 versions of Applications and Development Platform. This release also marks a freeze on APIs, dependencies and features so the team will now focus on hunting down bugs and polish it further.
-
With these things in mind, I very quickly focused on two desktop managers that might provide the desired desktop: Xfce and Trinity. Since I prefer to use openSUSE as the underlying operating system and Xfce is one of the desktop manager options fully supported by openSUSE installations, Xfce was an obvious first choice for consideration. This article will consider the Xfce desktop manager from the perspective of a KDE4 user and it is addressed to all those KDE4 users who feel similarly frustrated with the development direction KDE4 has taken.
-
Krita 2.8.0 was released yesterday, and this version comes with quite a big list of changes. In addition to the new features that were implemented, Krita is also available for Windows with an installer available from here.
-
The KDE Project has released a major new version of its Krita image editing software, with the latest version of the free and open source Photoshop replacement available for both Windows and Linux.
The latest update, version 2.8, marks a significant milestone for the software, marking the first stable version of the software released for Windows.
-
Krita 2.8 offers better tablet support based upon Qt's tablet code, a new high-quality scaling mode for Krita's OpenGL canvas, a new wrap-around mode, new brush presets, a layer picker, support for G'mic filters, and tons of new artist features and other improvements.
-
The Calligra team is proud and pleased to announce the release of version 2.8 of the Calligra Suite, Calligra Active and the Calligra Office Engine. This version is the result of thousands of commits which provide new features, polishing of the user experience and bug fixes.
GNOME Desktop/GTK
-
Ubuntu Gnome team wants to join the elite club of Ubuntu flavours which enjoy the LTS (Long Term Support) status. 14.04 is going to be an LTS release and its apt for Ubuntu Gnome team to get extended support of 2 years and 3 months as an LTS release which will make it easier for those users to use Gnome who want to use stable LTS releases.
-
Several other minor improvements have been added to this release, and various bugs have been fixed, including the removal of the “Now Playing” entry from the App Menu, songs are no longer being replayed when they’re paused, the current track is now restarted when the Previous button is clicked, and the position is greater than 3 seconds.
Mixed
-
The sleeper desktop environment – which I didn’t even considered years ago – has been XFCE. I've found that XFCE offers more robustness than say, LXDE, which lacks much of XFCE's polish in its default configuration. XFCE provides all the benefits one may have enjoyed in GNOME 2, but with a lightweight experience that makes it a hit on older computers.
-
Linux users do not like change. Well, actually, they do not like change for the sake of change. If something works, they typically hang on to it until something truly better comes along. A good example of this is GNOME 2. People love it and it works well. However, the GNOME Project moved to version 3 and radically changed how it works. GNOME purists were angry as version 2 worked just fine -- for them. And so, many hung onto the outdated version, shunning version 3.
Recent Techrights' Posts
- Destruction and Distortion of Information, Including Facts About Linux (Bonus: This is Destroying the Planet)
- All that LLMs have going for them is hype, and moreover media that intentionally misrepresents them and their supposed capabilities
- Google Seems to Have Just Killed All Instances of Invidious
- YouTube is rapidly becoming just "another Neflix"
-
- Italian Media Covers Richard Stallman's English Talk Ahead of Tonight's Public Appearance
- article in La Stampa
- Microsoft Skype in a Freefall: About 20% Decrease in Site Traffic in 3 Months (Amid Microsoft Phasing Out Credits)
- Microsoft axing more services/features may mean that now they scrape the bottom of the barrel and Skype will simply die, discontinuing service (like ICQ) in a matter of years
- Gemini Links 12/02/2025: Depression, Gabbro, WikiTok, and More
- Links for the day
- Links 12/02/2025: Health, Security, and Monopolies
- Links for the day
- Gemini Protocol is Increasingly Important to the Net
- Gemini Protocol will turn 6 this summer
- Former EPO Manager Warns That the Illegal 'Court' for "Unitary Patents" Enables “Law Shopping”
- Daniel X. Thomas opposed the very existence of the UPC, which any honest person could recognise was both illegal and unconstitutional
- Like GAFAM, the EPO is Passing the Financial Pains to Staff
- the EPO is operating illegally at this point
- Morale at Microsoft Ruined by the Company Labelling Thousands of Workers 'Low Performers', Sacking Them on the Spot and Denying Them Basic Benefits
- people laid off as "low performers" go to social control media to bemoan the label
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, February 11, 2025
- IRC logs for Tuesday, February 11, 2025
- Links 11/02/2025: Current state of the Internet and Smallnet Information Services (SIS)
- Links for the day
- Conservative Estimate: Over 10,000 IBM Workers to Be Laid Off in the Next Two Waves
- The morale is low and layoffs are expected soon, with mass layoffs likely happening next month and then again later
- Links 11/02/2025: Trade Wars and "Crisis for American Universities"
- Links for the day
- Parasitic LLM Slop Sites Destroy the Ability to Find "Linux" News in Google News
- Remember that Google News laid off lots of its workers
- Richard Stallman's English Talk in Italy Less Than 24 Hours Away (Torino) and Then Another Talk in Italy Scheduled (University of Bozen-Bolzano)
- He's active and he travels a lot in spite of his medical condition
- IBM Layoff Rumours, Large-Scale Implementations Weeks Ahead (in March 2025)
- There are some people corroborating
- Links 11/02/2025: Nutritional Poverty, Closure of USAID, More Fictional 'Valuations' Around Buzzwords
- Links for the day
- Perl Programming Leftovers
- recently in perl.org
- Microsoft in Africa: From 98% to Less Than 10% in Just 16 Years
- Microsoft being on less than 1 in 10 Web-connected devices in Africa is a very big deal
- Almost as If MElon Reads Techrights
- The joke we started appears to be spreading
- Microsoft Blasted for Adding Insult to Injury: Workers Laid Off Without Prior Notice, Without Severance Payment and Basic Coverage (Like Health), Then Stigmatised as Bad Performers So They Cannot Find a Job Elsewhere
- Such stereotypes end entire careers
- Gemini Links 11/02/2025: NeoVim and Deploying Other People's Code
- Links for the day
- BetaNews is Still Publishing LLM Slop/SPAM About "Linux"
- Assuming it is indeed LLM slop, it seems clear BetaNews has no intention of improving or is simply unable/unwilling to improve
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Monday, February 10, 2025
- IRC logs for Monday, February 10, 2025
- Scheduled Maintenance Tomorrow and on Valentines
- If the site (or Gemini capsule) is offline for a bit, the maintenance windows are likely the root cause
- If Matthias Kirschner Loves Free Software, He'll Change the Name of the Microsoft-Sponsored Organisation He Governs (in Order to Avoid Confusion)
- The FSF-EEE does not really like Software Freedom, it just loves money (including Microsoft's)
- Soylent News Lessens the Scope of Discussion Due to Persistent Trolling and Online Abuse
- if they make it a lot harder for new people to participate, then they limit the "general appeal" and reach
- EPO's Local Occupational Health, Safety and Ergonomics Committee (LOHSEC) in The Hague: Workers Are Getting Sicker, Conditions in Which to Assess Patent Applications Deteriorate
- "According to the Office statistics the total number of days of absence has gone up from 12.4 to 13.1 total number of sick days per Full Time Equivalent (FTE) from 2023 to 2024."
- The Standard Needs to Improve Its Standards for Fact-Checking, Aaron Swartz Had Nothing to Do With Reddit and He Detested the Company That Created It
- The Web is already bad enough as it is
- When the Livestream of Richard Stallman is Apparently Bury-Brigaded Offline You Finally Learn to Avoid Google/YouTube for Streaming
- Please, people, stop uploading to Google/YouTube
- New Paper From the EPO Highlights Large-Scale Discrimination at the Office, Where People Are Rewarded for Granting More and More Illegal Patents
- Even the Kremlin is probably more competent than this
- Links 10/02/2025: Ban on D.E.I. Language, Listeria Risk/Outbreak
- Links for the day
- Links 10/02/2025: Announcing "Stringless" and Mental Health Improvement
- Links for the day
- Links 10/02/2025: Facebook Mass Layoffs, "Meta" Did What Aaron Swartz Had Done But to the Tune of 81.7 Terabytes
- Links for the day
- Microsoft Tarnishing the Brand of Arch
- Of course Arch can do whatever it wants, but being associated with Microsoft is a badge of shame
- The Ultimate and Inevitable Fall of OpenAI (Even Brave is 'Bigger' Now)
- "When you advertise at the Super Bowl, you’ve reached just about every consumer in America. It’s the last stop. If you’re not profitable yet, you never will be."
- Adding Slop to Your Blog Only Makes One Assume All the Text is LLM Slop
- Simon Coter from Oracle has turned to slop
- Macao is Leaving Microsoft Behind
- Windows is falling to new all-time lows
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Sunday, February 09, 2025
- IRC logs for Sunday, February 09, 2025
- Microsoft's WSL (LSW) Shows That It Can Never Love Linux, Only Windows
- that's just how Microsoft rolls
- Activism in Times of War and a Coup
- 'Linux' Foundation works for fascism
- What the Silencing of Neatnik Tells Us About Linus Torvalds Inside a Microsoft-Dominated 'Linux' Foundation
- Is Linus Torvalds free to express his mind as he wishes about every topic, even just any technical topic?
- Windows Down to 11.35% in Senegal, as Measured by statCounter
- Another all-time low (Windows was at 99% in 2009)
- "Latest Technology News" in BetaNews is LLM Slop Promoting OOXML and Proprietary Software at the Expense of LibreOffice and OpenDocument Format (ODF)
- Remember that "open-source" and Open Source aren't the same; the former is fake